The challenge of attracting fish with lure and bait goes back millennia and has spawned much invention among fishermen and makers of tackle. For fishermen not content to adorn the end of their line with simple sinker and hook, non-disposable artificial lures of immense variety are known in the art. Most have no provision at all for bait, such as organic or animal mater, and instead depend on visual attractiveness. However, some non-disposable artificial lures have been developed with means for temporary attachment or enclosure of bait, such as animal or other organic matter, which provides non-visual sensory attractiveness to fish. It is improvement in this sort of fishing lure to which the present invention is directed.
The variety of available fishing lures for use at the end of a fishing line has increased with the availability and affordability of modern methods for fabricating and shaping materials—for example, metal and plastic—used in lures. Despite notable creativity in this area in recent decades, room for invention is far from exhausted.
Particular need exists for an attractive non-disposable lure that is capable of securely enclosing bait, large or small, while permitting natural flow of water through the bait-enclosing part of the lure, and wherein the bait-enclosing means provides for quick, simple and clean insertion, enclosure, removal and replacement of bait, facilitating clean and efficient switching of bait by the fisherman without switching lures, and which also serves effectively as a fish-attracting lure even in the absence of any enclosed or attached bait. These several advantages are the objects of the present invention.
This invention is an improvement in William G. Madala's fishing lure which is the subject of his co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 14/034,596, filed on Sep. 24, 2013. Such fishing lure includes (1) a head portion and (2) at least one flow-through appendage cavity portion secured to the head portion. More specifically, the head portion has a first securement surface and the cavity portion has a second securement surface, such securement surfaces being configured and dimensioned so that they are engageable with one another to secure the cavity portion to the head portion. If there is more than one cavity portion, each cavity portion has a second securement surface to engage a corresponding first securement surface of the head portion. The fishing lure also has a hook or other fish-catching member; the hook or other fish-catching member is preferably attached to the head portion of the fishing lure, typically in some dangling fashion.
The flow-through appendage cavity portion, or more accurately each flow-through appendage cavity portion, includes: an open front end and at such location its corresponding second securement surface; a closed tail end; and a substantially rigid sidewall between the front end and the tail end, the sidewall including a plurality of sidewall openings disposed to permit flow-through of fluid (water) while preventing pass-through of solids dimensioned greater than the widest sidewall opening. The cavity of the flow-through cavity portion is configured to hold bait inserted therein by the user, such that when the fishing lure is in the water, either still or moving through the water, the fish-attracting constituents of such bait emanate from the fishing lure, by virtue of its flow-through characteristic, and increase the attractiveness of the fishing lure to fish in the area.
In certain preferred embodiments, the sidewall of the flow-through appendage cavity is of wire mesh and the sidewall openings are apertures defined by intersecting wires of the mesh. Preferably, such sidewall includes many hundreds of sidewall openings, and the sidewall openings are sized to prevent flow-through of animal matter usable as fishing bait. Most preferably, the widest sidewall opening is less than about 2 mm in width.
It is highly preferred that the sidewall of the cavity portion of the inventive fishing lure be hollow and tubular, providing good capacity for bait material. Such sidewall may be of cylindrical, near-cylindrical or truncated conical shape. The cross-sectional shape of the sidewall can be in a smooth circular or other smooth shape.
In certain preferred embodiments, the sidewall of the flow-through cavity portion includes at least one longitudinal crease. Such crease may be formed by the folding of wire mesh material or may be formed by the joining together of free edges of a piece of wire mesh material, for example, such that there are two “creases”—one resulting from folding of wire mesh material and a generally parallel one from the joining of edges. In certain embodiments having at least one sidewall crease, the sidewall includes two opposing interior surfaces that meet at such at least one longitudinal crease and define an angle of 90° or less.
In certain preferred embodiments of such fishing lure, the head portion includes a marking, coloring or shape feature simulating an eye or other animal head part. This is believed to create visual interest for fish to go along with the non-visual sensory attractiveness provided by the bait or other material contained within the flow-through cavity portion.
In some preferred embodiments, the tail end of the of the cavity portion of the fishing lure also includes a capping element. The capping element is preferably manually removable by the user to open the closed tail end.
In some of such embodiments, at least one of the sidewalls and the capping element includes a marking, an applied coloring, an infused coloring or a shape feature simulating an animal body part. This marking, coloring and/or shaping is/are believed, as with respect to markings and features added to the head portion, to create visual interest for fish to go along with the non-visual sensory attractiveness provided by the bait or other material contained within the flow-through cavity portion.
Attachment and detachment of the flow-through cavity portion of the fishing lure from the head portion or, more accurately, opening and closing the cavity of the cavity portion, are preferably facilitated by the nature of the structure. There are various preferred structures for these purposes.
In certain highly preferred embodiments, the flow-through cavity portion is screwably attachable/detachable with respect to the head portion. In such cases, the first and second securement surfaces include corresponding threads.
In another preferred embodiment, the head portion and the cavity portion are attached to each other by a hinge, with one of the first and second securement surfaces of such portions including a latch and the other of the first and second securement surfaces including a latch-catch. The latch and the latch-catch define a point of securement after the cavity portion has bait or other material inserted in it.
In still other preferred embodiments, the first and second securement surfaces of the head portion and cavity portion, respectively, are frictionally engageable. In one highly preferred embodiment, the first and second securement surfaces are configured and arranged to be snap-engageable.
As already stated or implied above, some embodiments of such fishing lure include a plurality of flow-through appendage cavity portions. In such cases, the head portion includes a plurality of securement surfaces for simultaneous securing a corresponding plurality of cavity portions to the head portion.
Another aspect of such fishing lure is a flow-through appendage cavity member for a fishing lure, the cavity member including: an open end having a securement surface for securement to another portion of the fishing lure; a closed end; and a substantially rigid sidewall between the two ends which has a plurality of sidewall openings disposed to permit flow-through of fluid while preventing pass-through of solids dimensioned greater than the widest sidewall opening.
Another aspect of such fishing lure is that it includes: a first body portion that has a first securement surface; and at least one flow-through cavity portion appended to the first body portion, the cavity portion including (a) an opening and a second securement surface engageable with the first securement surface, (b) a substantially rigid sidewall, the sidewall including a plurality of sidewall openings disposed to permit flow-through of fluid while preventing pass-through of solids dimensioned greater than the widest sidewall opening.
As noted, the present invention is an improvement of such innovative lures.